AMD Actually Has Sense, But Congress Doesn't

The weekend has been pretty good, although I've had better here in Dallas. At least I've been finally able to do some cooking though, and hopefully I'll get some website work done this evening. John Dvorak has finally posted a reasonable opinion: maybe AMD's decision to buy graphics card manufacturer ATI was a good one. It was criticized at first by many as being too pricey (a hefty $4.2 billion) and a bit strange seeing as how AMD doesn't even sell chipsets with integrated graphics. What people have overlooked though are the possibilities in the home entertainment market. ATI could prove to be a valuable subsidiary if AMD wants to move into IPTV set top boxes or home media centers that could synchronize with your home computer. Of course, this is just speculation, but it would be neat if true. What's not smart though is that the House of Representatives has passed a bill that blocks social networking sites from schools and libraries. My problem with this bill is not that it tries to protect children, but that it's too broad in its terms. If you think too many kids are getting molested because they use MySpace then why not just block MySpace? Social networking is growing at a fast rate, and not all of it is dangerous. Like what's wrong with sites like Furl or Spurl? I hope it fails in the Senate because I hope that some of those guys in suits have the sense to not fall for rhetoric about protecting our children and crap like that through a blanket law.

It's always a little weird to see someone I've actually met in the news, so I just have to mention how funny it is that Jesper Johansson left Microsoft as their security guru since I just met him at a Microsoft tech talk a few months ago. He's a brilliant guy and I think he either left because he got tired of his job at Microsoft or because he was butting heads with the Vista team, but either way he's quite passionate about security. To top it off, M$ is going to start charging for downloading the Office Beta. Even though it's cheap, why would someone want to pay help Microsoft test unstable software? It just doesn't make any sense. I do have something positive from Microsoft: a video of Photosynth, an up and coming technology that would allow you to visit your digital photo library in 3-D. I don't know the details yet, but the video is pretty awesome. Google has added some new features to Google Talk, including a way to leave voicemail, but it still doesn't put them ahead of any of the other big IM players. On Friday, Apple was misquoted as saying that iPods were designed to last four years when they actually said "for years," which I mention because I'm tired of people asking me about alternate mp3 players because iPods are junk. A 5% failure rate is really good, in my opinion. PBS is jumping on the digital distribution bandwagon by offering some of its great shows (including Nova) on Google Video. I'm proud that they're taking this step, and I think that it'll definitely benefit schools that can show educational videos for free thanks to PBS. Tuaw has a review of the wireless Mighty Mouse for all you Mac lovers, and it sounds pretty on par with some of the better wireless mice out on the market for PCs right now. Lastly, any of you doing web development on a budget should give Aptana a look. It's like Eclipse, but for web development, though I'm saddened that it doesn't support PHP quite yet.

#1 this weekend was the movie I figured it would be: Miami Vice. However, it only raked in $25.2 million, which is only a few million more than Pirates of the Caribbean 2 over the weekend (which is now up to over $350 million). I'm sure that they're disappointed in Miami Vice's performance given its $130 million, while Dead Man's Chest is now Disney's highest grossing film of all time. Lady in the Water is much worse off than the former though with only $7 million, and Superman Returns is off the chart falling far short of its budget. JoBlo has a couple more ComicCon panel reports of interest. The first one comes from Spider-man 3, which is a better recap of the footage shown than I had previously plugged. Raimi still won't talk about the fourth villain, but I've posted who it was before and I don't feel like digging up the link again so you'll have to just be surprised if you missed it. The other panel report that was awesome was from 300, which is shaping up to be quite a visionary film. Zach Snyder is really building up my confidence in him. I also have a couple of trailers for you. The first comes from Crank, which is actually a bit different from what we'd previously seen and makes the film look like a fun action flick. The other trailer is for The Departed, which looks like it could be one of Scorcese's better movies, especially with the unbelievable cast he's assembled. Lastly, the MPAA has admitted to illegally copying This Film is Not Yet Rated just because it had bad implications for them. I think it's funny that they would be so hypocritical when they're in the crosshairs.

Now for some Unconscious Mutterings:

I say ... and you think ... ?

1. Italy :: Shaved Ice


2. Honk :: Horn


3. Shades :: Sunglasses


4. Tool :: Band


5. Modern :: Look


6. Tension :: Cord


7. Conservative :: Republican


8. Weight :: Loss


9. Insurance :: Car


10. Political :: Debate